Friday, April 25, 2014

The third installment of the Writing Process Blog Tour I've been participating in is up over at Rattle & Pen! You can check it out here.

It's been such a pleasure (and mildly terrifying) to think through my process as a writer. I'm still learning how to do this well. Hearing about how Kirsten Sundberg Lunstrum and Ginny Robinson at R&P think about their work and sometimes struggle to put thoughts to page is delightfully reassuring.

If you're a maker of anything- art, food, people, crafts- I highly recommend you read the full series thus far. I guarantee you'll find something that helps you breathe a sigh of relief. Making is hard work, people. But it is always worth it.

Sunday, April 6, 2014

Oh, hey! A thing happened! A glorious thing! A thing we parents fret over and suffer over and cause our children to suffer over! And that thing is called.... POTTY TRAINING.
Buh-buh-bummmmm.

Potty training happened in the House of Squishy. In fact, it happened over a month ago, but I was too frightened to write about it, lest I jinx it and kill it dead. But that didn't happen! It stuck! And I will tell you something: I did not do the potty training. Nope. I can take zero credit for this occurrence. This was, exclusively, AN ACT OF THE LITTLE ONE.

You see, potty training is a nightmare. I know this, all parents know this, and secretly, I think all kids know this too. There's so much push and pull and stress and MONEY that goes into the damn process (the books, the DVDs, the products, OH MY!), and really... we have no control over this situation. I really, truly believe it. NOT IN CHARGE HERE.

So, we've had the little potty and potty seat out and available for a good year. The Little One had periodically shown interest, but that interest quickly waned when he realized we were getting excited. "Oh, you want me to do that? Cool. I'm totally not gonna do that."

We went back and forth with him showing interest in sitting on the potty for like a week, and then it was all, "NO! NO POTTY. I WEAR DIAPERS." He was fond of diapers. He was comfortable in them, and he did not want to quit them. Even around 2.5 when we broke out the beloved character underpants, he'd want to wear them, pee in them within 10 minutes of putting them on, and be TOTALLY SHOCKED AND TRAUMATIZED that he'd just peed on Lightning McQueen. Every. Time. For months it seemed like he had no awareness whatsoever of when he might need to pee. He'd look up all wide-eyed and baffled, hollering, "Mommy? I pee? Pee in my underpants? OH NO!!!" Completely shocked every time pee exited his body.

And he had never once peed in the potty any of the times he'd sat on it. Not once. Never. So, not surprisingly, we didn't think he was ready. He was resistant, had no body awareness, and just not into it. So, fine. The Little One is a child that you DO NOT push (unless you want to experience the wrath of Kali + Demeter + Old Testament Yahweh), so we decided not to push it.

Then one day, in his diaper, the Little One grabbed his crotch and yelled, "I GOTTA PEE!!" with utter urgency. And volume. I whisked him into the bathroom, where we ripped off his diaper, sat him on the potty, AND THE CHILD PEED. For the first time ever in the potty. It was a goddamn miracle. And then, I asked if he wanted to wear underpants, and he said yes. And he wore them for the rest of the day and continued to announce when he needed to pee and only had one accident that day and two the next and that's it and oh-my-god-how-did-this-awesomeness-happen!?!?

There were two instances of pants-shitting (both proceeded by blood-curdling screams that, shockingly, did not tip us off that he was about to poop rather than die or burst into flames), but even that seems to be over. *manically knocks on every reachable wood surface*

So... now he's potty trained? It's all very weird and anticlimactic, really. And I realize this is the post where you all decide you hate me forever and I AM NOT COMPLAINING. Trust me. It was just so weird! He decided and he did it and that was that.

I don't know why I'm surprised since the Big One did the exact same thing when he was only 2 years old... but, dude. I can tell you one thing. We had a full on NO MORE DIAPERS party. There were donuts, there was dancing, there was joy and laughter. And also, my house no longer smell like shit! Or... well... I do have two boys. So, I suppose my house smells less like shit? WHO CARES. No more diapers.

Holy shit. No more diapers! It's a whole new world, people. A world in which I have a lot less literal shit to handle, and I can get down with that. Oh yes, I can.

About Me

I am the stay-at-home mama of a five and a half year old and a four year old. (I'm exhausted just typing that.) I am also a practicing and recovering English teacher with a gig as content writer. I have a deep, intense love for coffee, dark beer, poetry, short stories, chocolate, sleep and wit.
I created this blog in an effort to maintain my writing and my sanity. One for two ain't bad.
I'm also an essayist and can be found contributing regularly at Rattle & Pen and Luna Luna Magazine.
Feel free to comment, commiserate or question. Thanks for stopping by!